The counselor of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Environment and Environmental Policy of the Junta de Castilla y León, Antonio Pino, has raised with the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the convenience of introducing a simple adjustment in Spanish agricultural policy that places producers at the center and eliminates constant control or "distrust" towards farmers and ranchers.
Pino has presented this position in the Plenary of the Cortes of Castilla y León, in response to an interpellation registered by his own Parliamentary Group, Vox. During his speech, he emphasized that the primary sector operates in very competitive markets, assumes high costs, and faces requirements that are not demanded of imports, which is why he reiterated that the Junta will defend this vision before the central Government and Brussels with the aim of achieving a framework with fewer burdens, manageable regulations, and equal conditions.
The regional official has stressed that the priority of the regional Executive is to ensure that farmers, ranchers, irrigators, hunters, and fishermen can carry out their work with "legal security, fewer obstacles, and opportunities to obtain a decent income."
In this line, he recalled his own experience as a farmer to insist on the need to offer "reasonable regulations, expedite payments, and promote infrastructure, water, animal health, and commercial defense."
Among the actions already underway, Pino has focused on the recovery of controlled burning of stubble for the 2026-2027 campaign through prior communication, in response to phytosanitary problems, a tool that he has defined as "regulated and aimed" at safeguarding crops.
Likewise, he has expressed his confidence that the Ministry of Environment and Energy will soon give the green light to the burning of pastures for livestock, within a general criterion based on seeking "technical" and legal viability solutions instead of "prohibiting."
Following this management approach, the Agriculture counselor has also referred to the regulation of the wolf within the framework of population control, the promotion of the figure of the authorized veterinarian, and the outright rejection of the mandatory imposition of the digital exploitation notebook.
Likewise, it has emphasized that Castilla y León has positioned itself as the first Autonomous Community in Spain and the first region in Europe to advance the payment of CAP aids, after exhausting the available autonomous margin with measures of "flexibility such as early harvesting, livestock utilization, reduction in rotation requirements, or vertical tillage."
Regarding European funds, Pino has demanded a sufficient budget for the CAP, structured in two pillars and focused on the professional, without cuts or redistributive payments that penalize the size of the farms. He has also detailed the completion of the call for the incorporation of young people, with more than 900 beneficiaries and nearly 60 million euros, as well as the resolution of four improvement plans that exceed 118 million euros, advancing that the upcoming calls will have more agile procedures and a reinforcement of the integrated centers for agricultural vocational training.
In the area of irrigation, the counselor has set as an autonomous objective to bring the irrigable area of Castilla y León closer to the 23 percent that represents the national total, compared to the current 15 percent, through modernization actions and new developments.
In the hunting and fishing sector, he has announced the end of the obligation for digital sealing, the adaptation of regulations regarding night vision devices for wild boar control, and the commitment to pay before the end of 2025 the compensations for damages caused by wolves and bears corresponding to that fiscal year, also reducing the environmental assessment deadlines to a maximum of six months.
On the other hand, Pino has lamented the absence of a favorable response from the Ministry to the proposals of the Junta, agreed upon with agricultural professional organizations, to relax ecoregimes or bovine tuberculosis, against which the autonomous government is promoting a research project with a biosecure immunomodulator.
Finally, he has reiterated that the autonomous Administration refuses to support trade agreements or imports from third countries that do not include mirror clauses, effective controls, and guarantees of reciprocity for the sector.